A report released today by the National Research Council, solidified concerns brought forth by two grassroot, non-profits who opposed and fought the placement of the National Bio and Agro Defense Facility (NBAF) from being sited in North Carolina and Georgia. Both groups, the Granville Non Violent Action Team (GNAT) and AthensFAQ brought forth the same credible arguments presented in the NRC’s report. The report titled: “Evaluation of a Site-Specific Risk Assessment for the Department of Homeland Security’s Planned National Bio- and Agro-Defense Facility in Manhattan, Kansas” (that’s a mouth-full) was completed by DHS in June 2010.
The NRC report finally sheds some much-needed light on DHS’s flawed methodology and skewed data the agency used to justify the NBAF’s risk to near-by communities and livestock populations.
Upon review of the DHS assessment, the National Research Council found “several major shortcomings.” Based on the DHS risk assessment, there is nearly a 70 percent chance over the 50-year lifetime of the facility that a release of FMD could result in an infection outside the laboratory, impacting the economy by estimates of $9 billion to $50 billion. The present Research Council report says the risks and costs of a pathogen being accidently released from the facility could be significantly higher. The committee found that the SSRA has many legitimate conclusions, but it was concerned that the assessment does not fully account for how a Biosafety-Level 3 Agriculture and Biosafety-Level 4 Pathogen facility would operate or how pathogens might be accidently released. In particular, the SSRA does not include important operation risks and mitigation issues, such as the risk associated with the daily cleaning of large animal rooms. It also fails to address risks that would likely increase the chances of an FMD leak or of the disease’s spread after a leak, including the NBAF’s close proximity to the Kansas State University College of Veterinary Medicine clinics and KSU football stadium or personnel moving among KSU facilities.
Matt DeGennaro of AthensFAQ sums the report up quite nicely, “WE TOLD YOU SO” (and all we had was Google). Critical thinking suggest this report should lay to rest once and for all, the federally funded bio-hazard, right? No, not if the Kansas Congressional Delegation has its way.
“The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has chosen Manhattan as the site for the new NBAF. The construction of this cutting edge facility must move forward to safely conduct critical research to protect our nation’s agriculture sector and food supply. The National Research Council’s study is helpful to DHS as it continues in its design phase of the NBAF facility. We are also pleased that it confirms the importance of building a new NBAF to protect our nation. However, we are concerned that some of the findings do not seem to account for mitigation and safety plans that DHS has already said will be put in place. These efforts should not be discounted. We are confident this facility will be the safest research laboratory in the world and its mission is critical in order to protect our nation’s food supply.”
Absent critical thinking, politicos from the Kansas Congressional Delegation obviously can’t read ! U.S. Senator Pat Roberts knows first hand what an outbreak of FMD would do to his state. Sen. Roberts you see was the President of the U.S. during a government exercise known as Crimson Sky. Here is what he said about the mock FMD outbreak during a Senate Hearing ( To Review BioSecurity Preparedness and Efforts to Address AgroTerrorism Threats).
Senator ROBERTS.
Back in 2002, I joined an exercise held by the department called Crimson Sky. That was sort of a misnomer because it followed the experience of Great Britain in regards to their problems with their livestock herds. They used that method in regards in incinerating the animals, which is probably the worst thing you could have done, as we found out.
There wasn’t anybody else in town, so I played the role of President in this exercise, and it simulated the intentional introduction of foot and mouth disease in five different locations. By the way,the person who did that was from Iraq, at least in the exercise. The impact was incredible. In 6 days, if you do not detect the disease, that is when this or the effects of the disease first become obvious, and then it is too late. All of our exports stop. People in the cities discovered that their food doesn’t come from grocery stores, and panic set in. The markets went crazy.Basically, we had States calling out the National Guard. That is when we had the National Guard in the States, not over in Iraq and in Afghanistan and everywhere else, setting up all sorts of border situations so livestock in Texas couldn’t go to Oklahoma; Oklahoma couldn’t go to Kansas; Kansas couldn’t go to Nebraska; etc.,etc. It got pretty rough except everybody finally realized that all of the States were involved and we had to do something.
As President, I stopped the movement of all livestock. The Secretary of Commerce said you couldn’t do that. So I fired him, and it felt very good. But it was absolute chaos and not only for 1 year and not only for livestock, but every crop. So if you talk about a real problem, that was a real problem.
So, Chuck, can you tell me are you still conducting these kind of exercises? You probably don’t want to have me play President, but at any rate, are we doing the exercises that we need to do in conjunction with your compatriots up there on the panel, and has that impacted the way you do business?Senator ROBERTS. We had to terminate almost every herd in America. I mean that was the end result. It was an incredible experience when you really finally got down to the final answer to stop what was going on. We had to call out the National Guard and call out the military. Quite frankly, we ran out of ammunition. It was a mess, and then you had PETA on television, and I can’t describe the utter chaos that happened.
See folks this is the bottom line; Federal grant dollars have a way of creating amnesia. Here we have a person who knows first hand the economic damage caused by a mock- outbreak of FMD in the state of Kansas but continues to push for the NBAF. I don’t live in Kansas but if I did I’d be concerned, very concerned. Maybe real-life is too much for some people to believe, but when you involve their wallets everything changes, doesn’t it Sen. Roberts?
Beneficial Blog! I had been simply just debating the NBAF. There are plenty of screwy results at this issue you now purely replaced my personal belief. Thank you an excellent write-up.
So how is it that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in downtown Atlanta has been studying the most deadly and infectious diseases known to man since 1942 without an issue?
Dave Green,
The comparison between NBAF and CDC is misplaced. The NBAF champions still tout this false comparison despite the fact that it was debunked in the GAO’s 2008 and 2009 studies and yet again by the recent NAS report. Rod Trewyn and Tom Thornton should be ashamed of themselves for regurgitating such thoroughly debunked talking points.
Where do I begin? For starters, the continued (and tiresome) comparison of NBAF with CDC is inappropriate. Animal research at CDC is performed within safety cabinets/gloveboxes and is done on small animals. There are no “gloveboxes” for cows, sheep and swine. The animal room itself is the “glovebox” and people have to work/walk/kneel inside of it. The volume of waste produced by, say, mice and rhesus monkeys is incomparible to a cow – let alone a room containing 25-50 of them for an FMD vaccine challenge. Given this reality, there is a chance for mechanical transmission of the pathogen. The NAS report nicely covers the increased risk of aerosolization that can take place during routine cleaning.
Woking with 25+ cows in a room is very different than working with primates in a glovebox. Different species produce differing amount of virus – even when they have the same disease. Some species serve as amplifiers. A good example is the case of swine who are infected with Foot-and-Mouth disease. Pigs produce a tremendous amount of virus in their respiratory tract – as much as ONE MILLION virus particles per liter of exhaled air. Cattle are very susceptible to airborne transmission given the large tidal volume (big lungs) when they breathe.
Unlike at places like CDC, personnel working with dozens of cows exposed to FMD can be carriers of the disease. Why? Because they actually are in the “glovebox” (aka. room) with millions of virus particles. Mechanical transmission is a real concern. Mechanical Transmission of live FMD. Reference: Foreign Animal Diseases: 7th edition published by the US Animal Health Assn. in 2008. Page 264: “the potential for humans to harbor the FMDV in their respiratory tract has been investigated. It was noted that FMDV can be carried for a short period in the throats of people. Sampling of human subjects who had been in isolation rooms containing FMDV-infected animals demonstrated that the virus could be recovered from the nose, throat and saliva of 7-8 people up to 24 hours after immediately exiting the room.” In the history of accidental releases of FMD from bio-containment facilities, the overwhelming majority have ocurred due to human error.
The risk of Mechanical transmission of FMD is why Plum Island employees must comply with a personally recognizant quarantine for five days – every time they step foot into the lab. This means they must avoid susceptible species. This is relatively easy to do in Suffolk County, NY or Southeastern CT. Do you really expect every employee at NBAF to do the seem, even poorly paid cleaning contractors? How many will be tempted to visit Grandma on the ranch 2 or 3 days after being in the lab? As Rep. John Dingell said, this is a “foolish tempting of fate” that is contradicted by the reality that people are, well, human.
Most interesting is the fact that DHS itself concluded that there is a 70% probablity of the FMD virus escaping the NBAF within its projected 50 year life cycle. This is remarkable and should give everyone pause.
Finally, the NBAF champions love to cite the BSL-4 animal labs in Australia and Canada as justification for bringing NBAF to Kansas. There are, however, a few problems with this comparison: 1) Australia does not allow FMD research to be conducted in its lab; and 2) Canada only conducts FMD research at the BSL-4 level and has only one BSL-4 equipped room that can hold 2 cattle. NBAF will not conduct FMD reaserch at the BSL-4 level, it will conduct the reaserch at BSL-3Ag. Furthermore, NBAF will have dozens of FMD-exposed animals in its facility.
The NBAF champions march on in the face of damning counterarguments. Their talking points are repeatedly debunked, yet they still repeat them.
Enough!
Thanks so much for your thoughtful discussion and comment. Dave Green is from N.C. State University College of Veterinary Medicine and a former Consortium member. Amusing he is still trolling for the NBAF.
Thanks for your coverage.
The internal DHS Study Committee (SSRA) was about as close to an “inside job” as you could assemble and virtually all of the panelists had glaring conflicts of interest and personal stakes in seeing this project move forward.
Both of the USDA “independent experts” on the SSRA, Drs. Cyril Gay and Randall Leavings, were also members of the initial NBAF site visit team. Their efforts as site visit team members, largely informed the decision of siting NBAF in Kansas. They may have also met with Senator Pat Roberts during their 2007 site visits in Kansas.
SSRA members Steve Bennett, Dr. Michelle Colby, Dr. Bruce Harper and Dr. Joanne Jones-Meehan are all DHS employees. The notion that they would cast a skeptical eye towards a pet project of the DHS Secretary is laughable.
SSRA member Dr. David Brake is a contractor for DHS at Plum Island and his firm would have a vested financial stake in an expanded DHS countermeasure enterprise at NBAF.
SSRA member Dr. Josh Fine (SAIC) is also a contractor for DHS at Plum Island. His firm, SAIC, could potentially stand to gain a windfall if selected to provide SETA contract support at NBAF.
SSRA member Dr. Ted Schroeder is a professor at Kansas State. No conflict of interest there;) SSRA member Dr. Charles Hobbs is a “senior scientist emeritus” at the Lovelace Respiratory Reserach Institute. Lovelace’s President and CEO, Dr. Robert Rubin, was appointed in 2007 by then-Governor Kathleen Sebelius to serve on the “NBAF in Kansas Task Force.” Of course, there is no chance that Dr. Hobbs would come out against a major policy goal of his instiution’s President and CEO.
Other than the two HHS members, the SSRA panelists were riddled with ethical, professional, personal and financial conflicts of interest.
What is truly remarkable is that the NAS study came out the way it did. The NAS study was designed to be a “rubber stamp” and I feared it would be another “inside job.” Dr. Atlas, the NAS Committee Chairman, served on the DHS Homeland Secuity Science & Technology Advisory Committee (HSSTAC) (twice!) with Dr. David Franz, the “fixer” used by Kansas to bring NBAF to KSU. Dr. Franz sat on the HSSTAC as a “special government employee” all the while he was on the payroll of Kansas State and held appointments on the “NBAF in Kansas Task Force” and Kansas Bioscience Authority.
The fact that the NAS questioned the SSRA so strongly and thoroughly is heartening. I don’t think DHS was expecting this. The NAS study should serve as nothing less than a rebuke of DHS’ entire rationale for NBAF and its selection of Manhattan, KS as a site for live virus Foot-and-Mouth Disease research.